Neural Substrates of Human Facial Expression of Pleasant Emotion Induced by Comic Films: A PET Study

doi:10.1006/nimg.2002.1225

NeuroImage

Volume 17, Issue 2, October 2002, Pages 758-768

https://doi.org/10.1006/nimg.2002.1225 Get rights and content

Abstract

Laughter or smile is one of the emotional expressions of pleasantness with characteristic contraction of the facial muscles, of which the neural substrate remains to be explored. This currently described study is the first to investigate the generation of human facial expression of pleasant emotion using positron emission tomography and H₂¹⁵O. Regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF) during laughter/smile induced by visual comics and the magnitude of laughter/smile indicated significant correlation in the bilateral supplementary motor area (SMA) and left putamen (P < 0.05, corrected), but no correlation in the primary motor area (M1). In the voluntary facial movement, significant correlation between rCBF and the magnitude of EMG was found in the face area of bilateral M1 and the SMA (P < 0.001, uncorrected). Laughter/smile, as opposed to voluntary movement, activated the visual association areas, left anterior temporal cortex, left uncus, and orbitofrontal and medial prefrontal cortices (P < 0.05, corrected), whereas voluntary facial movement generated by mimicking a laughing/smiling face activated the face area of the left M1 and bilateral SMA, compared with laughter/smile (P < 0.05, corrected). We demonstrated distinct neural substrates of emotional and volitional facial expression and defined cognitive and experiential processes of a pleasant emotion, laughter/smile.

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Citation Excerpt :
In further relation to humour comprehension, we also see activation of subcortical structures such as the putamen. Although these regions did not form part of the current predictions, it is interesting to note that some subcortical areas have been implicated in the processing of humour in relation to irony (see Obert et al., 2016, for discussion), or as being activated during humour-induced smiling or laughter (Iwase et al., 2002). Other recent language studies (e.g., Viñas-Guash & Wu, 2017) highlight the potential role of this region in language comprehension more generally, arguing that contemporary neuroimaging techniques are revealing a language network which includes such brain structures that were not traditionally thought of as being involved in language comprehension.
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Regular ArticleNeural Substrates of Human Facial Expression of Pleasant Emotion Induced by Comic Films: A PET Study

Abstract

Trends. Neurosci.

Neuropsychologia

J. Neurol. Sci.

Mirth, laughter and gelastic seizures

Brain

The Expression of the Emotions in Human and Animals

The Duchenne smile: Emotional expression and brain physiology II

J. Pers. Soc. Psychol.

Guidelines for human electromyographic research

Psychophysiology

Electric current stimulates laughter

Nature

Spatial registration and normalization of images

Hum. Brain Mapp.

Statistic parametric mapping in functional imaging

Hum. Brain Mapp.

Epileptic (gelastic) laughter

Epilepsia

The functional anatomy of humor: Segregating cognitive and affective components

Nat. Neurosci.

Amygdala activity related to enhanced memory for pleasant and aversive stimuli

Nat. Neurosci.

Wirkungen der reizungen und koagulation bei stereotaktischen hirnoperation

Nervenarzt.

Localization of emotional and volitional facial paresis

Neurology

Emotional facial paresis of pontine origin

Neurology.

Diminished facial expression despite the existence of laughter pleasant emotional experience in schizophrenia

Methods Find. Exp. Clin. Pharmacol.

Emotion

Emotion circuits in the brain

Annu. Rev. Neurosci.

Gelastic epilepsy. A review and report of five cases

Epilepsia

Regular Article
Neural Substrates of Human Facial Expression of Pleasant Emotion Induced by Comic Films: A PET Study